A ‘Banana Republic’ without the Bananas? Political Economy, IrishExceptionalism and Mary Daly’s Sixties Ireland

Brownlow, G. (2018). A ‘Banana Republic’ without the Bananas? Political Economy, Irish Exceptionalism andMary Daly’s Sixties Ireland. Irish Economic and Social History, 1-10.https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0332489318794689

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Irish Economic and Social History

Review article

A ‘Banana Republic’ without the Bananas? Political Economy, Irish Exceptionalism and Mary Daly’s Sixties Ireland

Graham Brownlow, Queen’s Management School

Mary E. Daly, Sixties Ireland Reshaping the Economy, State and Society, 1957-1973 (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 2016, 426 pp., £19.99 paperback)

Mary Daly’s analysis within Sixties Ireland is a useful corrective to simplistic and self-

congratulatory narratives concerning the place of the ‘long 1960s’ within modern Irish social and

economic history. Daly’s interesting discussion covers the period between the First Programme for

Economic Expansion (as well as membership of the World Bank and IMF) in 1957 and Ireland’s entry

into the Common Market in 1973. The book is particularly strong concerning interest groups lobbying.

Daly outlines, in a highly persuasive fashion, how ‘auction politics’ arrived in Ireland and how

squabbles within the civil service (and other public bodies) hindered effective policy formulation and

implementation. Daly is excellent in discussing the role of interests and ‘auction politics’ in explaining

the pace and direction of change. The ambition and scope of Sixties Ireland ensures that it will

undoubtedly serve as a launch pad for many a future PhD thesis as well as providing a core text on

undergraduate and postgraduate level modules in modern social and economic history. Furthermore,

students of applied economics, political science and sociology will also find much to pique their interest.

Nevertheless, this reviewer had some reservations, to be discussed in more detail at the end of this

review article, for example Daly is weak on explaining the role of ideas in explaining the evolution of

economic policy. Daly’s analysis nevertheless can provide a building block towards constructing an

institutional rather than exceptionalist analysis of how economy, state and society was reshaped. Daly

however appears at points to suggest ‘a middle ground’ between Lee’s exceptionalist argument (i.e. that

Ireland uniquely underperformed economically due to among other things perverse incentives) and

more recent critiques of the exceptionalist argument.1 Daly accepts that her focus on tradition and

continuity for instance chimes with Lee’s discussion of the way Ireland was shaped by the tenacity of

the possessor over the performance ethos (p.11).

Sixties Ireland is the product of over a decade’s work, as the book’s acknowledgements note,

the book’s gestation was delayed by Daly’s role as Principal of the UCD College of Arts and Celtic

Studies. In the language of the modern managerial university – a technocratic and ugly terminology that

Professor Daly’s tenure as Principal would undoubtedly have brought her into contact with - Sixties

Ireland implies that in constructing a hypothetical SWOT (strengths weaknesses opportunities and

threats) analysis we should focus more on the weaknesses and threats than the conventional narratives

discuss. Moreover, Ireland’s ability to exploit opportunities was more complicated that is often

assumed. Lemass comes out of Sixties Ireland as far less a reformist figure than in accounts such as

Lee’s. Lee after all argued that Lemass was technocratic and pragmatic and should be interpreted as

attempting to shift the balance between performer and possessor principles.2 Daly in contrast notes the

continuing influence of religious conservatism within Lemass’ conceptualisation of socio-economic

reform.3 In terms of the basic revisionist thesis of the book. Daly does not challenge the idea of

improvement, however, but she takes a more pessimistic view of the rate of change and the eventual

results of such changes. She suggests both that the degree of change is often overstated and that Ireland

had no choice other than abandoning protectionism. Daly persuasively argues that persistently

conservative attitudes towards social policy and religion with respect to education, health and welfare

were shaped by the ongoing influence of Catholicism (and Irish Christian Brother education in

particular) (pp.57-59).

One particularly important corrective of Sixties Ireland is Daly’s observation that many of the

industrial policy features adopted during the period (e.g. advance factories) represented emulation of

longstanding Northern Irish policies. Likewise, she observes that by the early 1970s discussions of Irish

unity prompted comparisons between welfare services in the two jurisdictions. When government

departments were examining the constitutional question they very quickly highlighted that social

services were better funded in Northern Ireland (p.251). The discussion within Sixties Ireland is hence

a useful corrective to the self-congratulatory idea that while Northern Ireland urgently needed reform,

independent Ireland voluntarily both modernised and took great interest in ensuring that faultlines

within Northern Irish society could be rectified. A strength of Daly’s analysis is that demonstrates that

Ireland’s governing elite was compelled by circumstance into internal reform and took very little

constructive interest in Northern Irish affairs for most of the 1960s.

The book draws on a wide range of primary and secondary sources. Two observations on the

archival sources are worth further comment: first, the archival sources drawn upon within Sixties

Ireland are focused on a ‘top down’ approach, so it is consequently hard to see what the average trade

unionist or housing rights campaigner for example thought about the pace and direction of reforms.

Second, the archival trail followed within Dublin and Kew is impressive, but there is no reference to

resources held at PRONI. As we will see later in this piece, the attitudes and constraints facing Northern

Irish governments were more complicated than Daly assumes.

The focus on elite attitudes is apparent throughout Sixties Ireland. For example, T.K. Whitaker,

probably the book’s major recurring actor, in a simultaneously conservative and perceptive insight,

blamed inflationary wage pressures on a process of ‘social psychological change’. Whitaker argued that

workers looked ‘up the social structure’ in order to narrow the wage gap relative to the better off (p.37).

The net result of such a process in the Irish economy - with extremely limited autonomy in the area of

monetary policy - would be to bid up wages (and/or increase strike activity) thereby reducing export

competitiveness and economic growth. Given the limited range of policy tools at Ireland’s disposal,

Whitaker’s diagnosis that it was inevitable that protectionism needed reversing is one that should be

treated sympathetically (pp.45-46). Whitaker’s arguments, judged as a piece of economic analysis are

interesting. Daly summarises this material well; she is much weaker when comes to considering the

intellectual influences on Whitaker.4 Daly appears uninterested in the way that economic ideas are

formed within policymakers’ minds and far more interested in interdepartmental intrigues. The

evolution of thinking within influential bodies such as the IPA and ESRI during the period 1957-73,

intellectual trends highly relevant to explaining the direction and pace of reform, for example is not

discussed within Sixties Ireland.

Sixties Ireland is constructed around three thematic sections (economy, society and politics).

Each of these sections in turn is divided into subthemes. Poor industrial relations, a by-product of poor

leadership within both business and trade unions, is a topic that pervades Part I (covering chapters 1-

5).5 As Daly notes drily in response to the 1970 bank strike – when banks were closed for over six

months- the comment was made ‘Ireland once again showed itself to have all the marks of a banana

republic except the bananas’ (p.83). That such a comment came in an official report rather than a

satirical magazine demonstrates a degree of resignation about Ireland’s predicament. In part II (chapters

6-11) social change comes under the microscope. Daly observes that social change in a range of areas

was slower to occur than is often supposed. Again the tone of Part III covering politics and international

relations (chapters 12-14) is revisionist. The decision to discuss political topics last is deliberate, as

Daly states that ‘electoral politics was essentially responding/reacting to the changes in the economy

and in personal lives’ as described in Parts I and II (p256).

Chapter 1 acknowledges that an absolute improvement in living standards occurred; the terms

of trade shifted to the extent in 1973 that 39 per cent more imports could be bought than in 1957 for a

similar quantity of exports (p.34). Daly however notes that that this absolute improvement did not

translate into a relative improvement. In any case Ireland’s relative backwardness should have ensured

it grew faster than the UK but that did not occur as Ireland remained excessively dependent on the slow

growing UK economy (p.35). In consequence Ireland shared the same sources of poor growth as those

causing Britain’s relative decline. Daly argues furthermore that Irish actors (including government,

unions and business) compounded these ‘British disease’ type problems with a few indigenous

weaknesses unique to Ireland.

Chapter 2 turns its attention to economic planning; at one point the Second Programme of

1963/64 is likened to ‘snake-oil medicine’ (p.52). Daly adds to the ‘revisionist’ reinterpretation of

Economic Development observing (correctly) that it represented a market-orientated approach to

economic restructuring in which public expenditure was to be controlled and taxation and subsidy was

to be reduced (pp.40-41). In terms of new insights, Daly (drawing on World Bank archival material

provided by Patrick Honohan) observes that the World Bank viewed the Programme for Economic

Expansion as a ‘retrograde step’ relative to the more market-based approach outlined in Economic

Development (p.41). Again the dilution of Economic Development is attributed to political economy

concerns.6 Daly is particularly perceptive concerning the legacy of protection on the quality of Irish

management within the private sector (p.47) and the sluggish pace of reform within the civil service

(p.55). Again the excessive influence of competing and conflicting Departmental worldviews is

presented as making the task of formulating and implementing coherent reform more difficult.

In Chapters 3 and 4 the focus shifts to considering industry, trade unions and agriculture. Once

again the managerial faultlines within Irish economic performance are identified. Daly echoes the

earlier message of chapters 1 and 2 by noting that the ‘introversion and intellectual mediocrity identified

in the civil service applied with equal and perhaps greater force in business’ (p.63). Family ownership,

protected markets, old school ties and stifling corporate cultures are all identified as hindering economic

restructuring. Even inward investment was mixed in terms of its results largely because those made

unemployed by the arrival of new foreign–owned firms often lacked the occupational or geographical

mobility to benefit from restructuring (p.76). Once again the existence of competing inward investment

agencies is noted, the revealing observation is made that the proposal that one agency should handle

such investments was exercised from Economic Development prior to publication (p.72).

In chapter 4 Daly starts by noting that in stark contrast to the tripartite structures characteristic

in industry, that there was no attempt to create a National Agricultural Council. Daly argues

persuasively that Irish agriculture was as much reliant on export markets as industry, so the suspicion

is that political factors explain the divergence between the respective policy frameworks. Furthermore,

once again the existence of rival agencies slowed the progress of creameries rationalisation. Ireland by

the late 1960s, in line with other Western European countries, had created an ‘agricultural welfare state’,

where taxpayers via price or income subsidies redistributed their income towards family farms.

Chapter 5 focuses on regional and physical planning and the observation is made that Ireland,

accustomed to economic decline and emigration, was ill-prepared for the new policy challenges of

industrialisation, housing shortages and urban economics. The attempt at creating growth centres

became enmeshed in ‘parish-pump politics’ (p.102); the scattering of industry was not matched by

developing a network of motorways or supporting telecommunications (pp.105-6).

Chapter 6 considers issues like social mobility, religiosity and class. Once again the

interconnections between the old school tie and career opportunities comes to the fore of Daly’s

analysis. In this analysis, as the need for an educated workforce altered the balance between the church

and state in educational provision, the direction of causality ran more from the economic to the social

rather than vice versa. Likewise, higher economic growth reduced emigration and this reduction in turn

increased the proportion of younger, and often more liberal, people within Ireland’s population. A net

consequence of these demographic and attitudinal shifts was to provoke further challenges to religious

viewpoints on sexual morality. However, Daly notes that as late as 1973, neither the church, nor the

state, nor the democratic majority were willing to facilitate access to reliable contraception (even in the

case of married couples), or the ability to get divorced (p.129); Daly notes, such issues would divide

Irish society for decades to come.

In chapters 7 and 8 the analysis considers marriage, fertility and other aspects of social life.

The rise of commercial dance halls and Showbands and the shift away from parish hall dances is seen

as emblematic of the emergence of modern Ireland; as Daly demonstrates even this phenomenon had

its limits. Dances were avoided on Saturday nights because of the fear young people would miss Sunday

mass, and no dances were allowed during Lent, when bands toured England. Chapter 8 develops this

line of argument by considering the place of women within Irish society. Again the observation is made

that that women in public service remained required to resign on marriage. Furthermore, some private

sector firms also operated a formal marriage bar (p.152). Daly observes that even when formal reform

came it was only in the 1980s that significant numbers of married women began to remain in

employment after giving birth (p.157). The slow and uncertain path to equal pay is also discussed, Daly

notes it was labour shortage rather than enlightenment that drove improvement working conditions.

One aspect discussed in chapter 8 is a reluctance to afford widows a statutory right of inheritance as a

consequence of the divorce prohibition. The generally lamentable treatment of widows was exemplified

by the fact that widows of TDs often stood for election because they had no alternative means of support

and it was only in 1968 that TD widow pensions were introduced. In areas of adoption, traveller rights

and institutional care the chapter illustrates that it was far from the best of decades for many people.

In chapter 9 feminist responses to the sluggish pace of social reforms are discussed: Daly notes

that even when social reform, in the cases of contraception or censorship, were discussed, they were

often discussed with reference to the national question rather than personal liberty (p.185). It is notable

that John Charles McQuaid considered that liberalising contraception legalisation would ‘be a foul basis

on which to construct the unity of our people’ (p.186) and that an RTÉ journalist making a documentary

about purchasing condoms in Enniskillen duly had them confiscated by a customs officer at what could

now be termed a moral hard border (p.187). Again the interlinkage between education, attitudes and

class pervades the discussion. It was younger, often Dublin-based, women holding down professional

jobs that most advocated social reforms. In contrast, women from rural (and particularly farming)

background who were most hostile to such social reforms (p.190).

In Chapter 10 the consequences of debates over social issues for Ireland’s Churches is the

focus. The limits of secularism and the ubiquity of religious segregation is apparent from the discussion.

Again the interlinkage with earlier chapters is apparent: the emergence of commercial dance halls, more

open recruitment in the professions and commercial life and a greater stress on ecumenical activity are

all noted as giving limited impetus to better inter-church relations. However, Daly notes that in the

1950s religious segregation was still widespread. There were separate schools and universities for the

privileged minority within both communities and there remained different employers (p.194).7 The

discussion of Vatican II, literary and film censorship, television and Humane Vitae within the chapter

all tends to support Daly’s conclusion that if the 1960s indicated ‘an end to Catholic Ireland, this proved

a very long drawn-out process’ (p.213). Daly does much to demonstrate the existence of a stultifying

conformism and religious segmentation rather than pluralism characterised much of independent

Ireland’s social life.

The ramifications of this continued social conservatism and religious segmentation for

education, health and welfare concludes Part II. The discussion in chapter 11 again links back to the

observation from Part I that Economic Development envisaged that (limited) public spending should

focus on ‘productive’ investments aimed at directly growing the economy’s private sector rather than

creating a Keynesian welfare state. Daly notes furthermore that there was no concept that children

should have the right to attend a post-primary school within easy reach (p.217). Once again

interdepartmental squabbles and the desire of Churches to continue to control schooling affected the

quality of educational provision.8 Daly is equally forensic in her discussion of Irish higher education

as again she demonstrates the continued salience of religious segregation.9 Daly accepts that by the

early 1970s the Catholic Church’s role within higher education dwindled, but it remained ‘a powerful

force at primary and second levels’ (p.232).

In terms of health and welfare, as discussed in chapter 11, again political economy

considerations are to the fore. The continued role of voluntary schooling and hospitals is observed. For

example, lobbying by agricultural interests prevented efforts at informing consumers of the link

between animal fats, high cholesterol and coronary heart disease (p.247). Given the role of lobbying in

shaping Irish health policy it is unsurprising that Daly concludes that an excessive number of small

county hospitals continued to be funded, in contrast GP services and preventative medicine continued

to be under-resourced (p.250). Daly demonstrates that the period 1957-73 was characterised by an

expansion of the state. Public expenditure grew from 29-31 per cent of GNP in the early 1960s to 40-

43.5 per cent by 1971 (p.250). By the mid-1970s Ireland devoted a similar share of its economy to

public spending as other western democracies. Social spending was an important driver of this shift

towards big government: per capita spending on social welfare in real terms grew by 55 per cent

between 1966 and 1973 (p.250).

In Part III the emphasis shifts to politics and international relations. Daly in Chapter 12 turns

her attention towards the Irish party system. She notes the ideological commonalties between the two

major parties and she observes that Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour were equally supportive of

Catholic teachings regarding moral and social questions (p.257). Fianna Fáil was returned in each

election between 1957 and 1973, and each election was dominated by social and economic issues, Daly

suggests Fianna Fáil’s electoral dominance was not simply a vote of confidence in its ability to manage

economy and society, rather it reflected Labour’s refusal to enter into another a coalition and the

inability of Fine Gael or Labour of forming a single-party government. Daly suggests that by 1965

‘auction politics’ had arrived with politicians enticing voters with promises of jobs and public spending

(p.262). Clientelist politics, patronage, party fund-raising, electoral dynasties and the electoral power

of constituency work are highlighted in the chapter’s valuable discussion of ‘auction politics’.

Chapter 13 covers Ireland’s attitudes to international relations, reflecting Daly’s emphasis on

economic considerations as a driver of social and political reform, she suggests that it was the decision

to apply for EEC membership and abandon protectionism that forced its attitudes in this area to change

(p.299). Daly observes that developing commercial relationships with America and Europe came to

the fore, while in the years preceding the Troubles partition receded into the background. Ireland had

very limited military strength so NATO membership was not regarded as outsiders as of much

consequence (p.311). So the continued symbolism of Ireland’s refusal to join NATO appears to have

however been tied in Irish minds to the national question. This negotiating position appears to have at

the very least puzzled T.K. Whitaker in his attempt to secure EEC membership (p.311). Daly likewise

regards De Gaulle’s veto of UK membership in January 1963 as a ‘blessing’ for Ireland’s application

hopes, as the veto gave Ireland time to liberalise trade (p.313). The common interest with the UK of

EEC membership, as well as the continued economic dependence on the British market for exports,

ensured that ‘Britain loomed much larger for the Irish government than Ireland did for Britain’ (p.321).

It was the unfolding Northern Ireland crisis, rather than waning economic dependency, that reignited

the primacy of the divisive constitutional question.

In chapter 14 the unfolding of civil unrest north of the border is highlighted and Daly emphases

Dublin’s lack of knowledge of Northern Ireland, indeed the chapter is very much a story of ‘a place

apart’. It is clear from the discussion that the predicament facing northern Nationalists was less of a

concern to the Dublin government than securing the benefits of European economic integration.

Furthermore, even when a Cabinet memo written in 1966/1967 considered the potential economic and

socio-political repercussions of a peaceful ‘reintegration of the national territory’ it was accepted that

inferior social services relative to those found in Northern Ireland reduced the likelihood of successful

unification (p.329). Daly contrasts what she terms T.K. Whitaker’s ‘realism’ regarding concerns that

Northern Ireland’s precarious public finances could not be easily absorbed into any unified state, with

what she regards as his ‘naïve optimism about prospects for internal reform in Northern Ireland’ (p.338).

The overall picture she draws is that the crisis forced political parties to reconsider the national question,

civil rights and security, but this greater awareness reinforced Northern Ireland’s status as ‘a place

apart’.

In terms of evaluating the discussion of Northern Ireland within Sixties Ireland, and in the light

of archival materials which this reviewer has made extensive recourse to, some degree of latitude in

required in studying north-south relations. O’Neill operated under significant institutional and political

constraints that Lemass would not have to contend. Increasing the level and quality of inward

investment into Northern Ireland required modifying the system of industrial policy by making policy

less prone to capture by vested interests. Furthermore, the attempt at creating a more tripartite form of

policymaking in the form of the Northern Ireland Economic Council (NIEC) suffered from the fact that

unions boycotted NIEC because the Northern Irish government refused to recognise the Northern

Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions until 1964. Likewise, in addition to the hurdles

O’Neill faced in reforming industrial relations, the ongoing efficiency weaknesses within shipbuilding

and aircraft sectors needed a lot of attention as did attempts at redefining the financial relationship with

the Treasury. Overall, had a greater attention been paid to Northern Irish archival material, then a more

nuanced view of the priorities facing O’Neill would have been made and an even more sophisticated

interpretation would have emerged.

In interpreting Ireland 1957-73 it is important not to take an excessively ‘exceptionalist’ tone.

As O’Rourke has demonstrated, Irish economic performance in the seventy-five years after 1926 was

in line with the expected initial income level.10 The underperformance, such as it was in the 1960s,

O’Rourke has attributed to sharing in ‘stop-go’ cycles with the UK and former colonies such as

Australia and New Zealand. Ireland’s predicament was unlike the UK that it could not devalue the

currency to break such a cycle. 11 However, O’Rourke’s analysis suggests that 1958 was not such a

turning point. Ireland was a founder member of the OEEC and European Payments Union.

Daly’s analysis may be fruitfully refined and extended by considering the general insights of

Luigi Zingales.12 His economic analysis of the political economy of corporate interests has many facets

relevant to modern Irish economic history. Essentially Zingales framework revolves around the insight

that a main employer in a jurisdiction is politically influential; this analytical insight holds even if the

actor (eg agriculture) sells in a highly competitive market outside that jurisdiction. Market power

compounds the problem by ensuring influential actors become more effective at obtaining what they

want from the political system and patron-client relationships evolve and this empowers vested

interests. Strong market power will thus enable powerful actors to erect entry barriers and entrench

themselves. Zingales argues that such a political-economic interaction, of the type Daly’s analysis can

be refined to include, can create a “Medici vicious circle” in which economic and political power

reinforces each other with the net result that certain interests may gain at societal expense.13

If such a general interpretation of economy, state and society is correct, then, far from Ireland

being exceptional in its development path as Joe Lee and others would have us believe, modern Irish

economic history was very much followed the norm in the way Kevin O’Rourke demonstrates:

European economic integration and successful restructuring were interconnected. A number of topics

need to be explained in future research. For example, the way in which corporate elites interacted with

the emerging ‘technocratic elite’ of politicians and civil servants needs further exploration. Even if Daly

is correct about the net benefits of this gradual shift towards reshaping economy, society and state, the

distributional consequences needs more consideration than Daly provides. In the humble opinion of this

reviewer, Lee’s exceptionalist line of argument, with its sociological and psychological focus, a focus

that Daly has some sympathy with, is much less persuasive than O’ Rourke’s more economically-

grounded discussion. Daly’s emphasis on the particularities of Irish political economy is however a

valuable contribution and should influence future research. O’Rourke’s indicates that the Irish pattern

of ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ shared general features with other national experiences. Sixties Ireland

illustrates however does illustrate features unique to the Irish case in the areas of social reform.

In developing or thinking about the distributional consequences of the Irish experience

between 1957 and 1973, one possible mechanism that may explain the path Ireland followed is that the

shift towards inward investment and European economic integration (as well as the shift away from

Britain) ‘short-circuited’ the established patron-client relationships as well as gave rise to new economic

ideas. For example UCD within Europe was in 1964 a pioneer in introducing the Master of Business

Administration into European higher education. Given the role of this American model of business

education in promoting higher quality management and productivity, future research may seek to link

this Americanisation in Ireland’s universities with restructuring within Ireland’s public and private

sectors. Likewise, further research on lobbying and the transition way from an older more agrarian elite

towards a new one will require a greater emphasis be placed on the social and economic role of business.

It is the ‘short circuiting’ that Lee focused on, but the economic processes were more subtle than he

acknowledged. Such a research agenda will tend to downplay the exceptionalist line of argument and

allow future historians of Ireland to make use of applying the modern literature in institutional analysis.

Sixties Ireland will be another building block in constructing this new project.

1 J. Lee, Ireland 1912-1985 Politics and Society (Cambridge, 1989). 2 Lee, Ireland 1912-1985, p.396.  3Daly for instance suggests that Tom Garvin’s opinion of Lemass ‘borders on hagiography’ (p.332). Daly suggests that religious conservatism shaped the way Lemass thought economic activity should be pursued. For example, in 1961 in discussing wage bargaining Lemass argued, in line with the recent encyclical Mater et Magistra by Pope John XXXIII, that wage bargaining had to be for the good of the community and that sectional interests needed to be subordinated to the common good (p.48). Lemass even went to the extreme of advising all of his ministers to keep a copy of this encyclical on their desks (p.95). 4 Whitaker took a degree in economics in 1941 and an MSc in 1952. He was an external student of the University of London, and the examiners involved included Arthur Seldon, who later was to promote free market reforms within Britain as Editorial Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA). Seldon, and other academics within the University of London external examining system, held out against the Keynesian revolution long after the managed economy had become the mainstream view within the Anglo-American economics profession. Seldon, after taking both undergraduate and postgraduate degrees at the London School of Economics acted as a Tutor on the external degree 1946-56 and was a Staff Examiner for the London School of Economics between 1956 and 1966. The overlap between the LSE and IEA did much to promote economic liberalism. It is in this intellectual milieu that Whitaker’s views on economics was shaped. For a discussion of University of London and the rise of economic liberalism see R. Cockett, Thinking the Unthinkable: Think Tanks and the Economic Counter-Revolution (London, 1994). For a much more recent critical evaluation of the consequences of this intellectual trend from the perspective of economic history see A. Offer and G. Söderberg, The Nobel Factor: the Prize in Economics, Social Democracy and the Market Turn (Princeton, 2016). 5 Daly notes that teachers and guards were among the most militant. This was a militancy based on the fear of a loss of relative income vis-á-vis the private sector (p.81). Relative decline in the pay of middle class careers explain much of the strike activity. 6 For example, the structure of the Committee on Industrial Organisation (CIO), and its ability to recruit technical experts, was watered down by interdepartmental squabbles (p.47). The newly created Economic Development Branch in Finance – later renamed ‘Development Division’ – drove the issue of implementation though it did so against opposition from other government Departments. The Economic Development Branch operated very much in Whitaker’s intellectual shadow, it was for example headed by Charles Murray, a major contributor to Economic Development, and Louden Ryan of TCD was a technical director (as well as Whitaker’s University of London PhD thesis examiner) (p.43). 7 The observation that until 1966, UCD students were expected to stand in the library at noon and 6 PM to recite the angelus (p.194) was a particular stark reminder that Irish higher education was still not about free enquiry. 8 Daly however acknowledges the importance of the O’Malley imitative, so by 1974 free secondary schooling had come to be seen as a right rather than a privilege (p.227). 9 Based on the data Daly provides, only 1 per cent of UCC students in 1966-67 were not Catholic and around of a tenth of that figure held for UCG (p.227). TCD, with McQuaid’s ban still in force, drew on a student body which one-third came from outside Ireland, mainly Britain; a further third came from Northern Ireland (p.228). 10 K.H. O’Rourke, ‘Independent Ireland in Comparative Perspective’, Irish Economic and Social History, 44 (2017), 19-45. 11 O’Rourke, ‘Independent Ireland’. 12 L. Zingales, ‘Towards a Political Theory of the Firm’, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 44 (2017), 113-130. 13 Zingales argues that the reinforcement of corporate and political power is endemic throughout global economic history. He suggests by way of illustration that it goes towards explaining how Florence during the Middle Ages from being one of Europe’s industrial and commercial powerhouses into what he terms ‘a marginal province of a foreign empire’ Zingales, ‘Towards a Political Theory of the Firm’, p.120.